The prevention of tampering, unauthorized use, and unauthorized extraction of information from microdevices is a long standing and extensive multidisciplinary problem. The strategies of prevention can range from secrecy protection of designs and production processes of a particular microdevice to the broad area of data encryption and protected data exchange and storage. The domain of the present invention is protection of stored and structure-related information incorporated in microdevices by the physical destruction of the microdevice regions containing such information in the event that tampering, unauthorized use, and/or unauthorized extraction of such information is likely to occur. Various embodiments of the present invention employ usage of high power electrical drivers that deliver sufficient electrical energy for permanent destruction of the information containing structures of protected microdevices.
Today, the most common example of a microdevice that may need to be protected from tampering, unauthorized use, and unauthorized extraction of information is the electronic microchip also commonly known as an “integrated circuit.” Electronic microchips are ubiquitous in industrial, military, and consumer products. With this in mind, some of the presented embodiments of the invention are illustrated and evaluated using an electronic microchip as a target. However, it is important to note that the present invention is not limited to electronic devices or microchips. Apparatuses and methods in accordance with the present invention can be used to obliterate information on a variety of microdevices including, but not limited to, magnetic memory strips and media; removable memory modules and cards; security identification cards, chips, and keys; RFID tags and interrogators; MEMS; biochips; sensors; and other electronic, electro-mechanical, photonic, fluidic, chemical, and hybrid devices.
Newly developed electrical high power pulsed technology selectively obliterates targeted information containing structures by providing a controlled high power discharge in the proximity of the information containing structures. Various embodiments of the present invention include methods and devices invented for commanded obliteration of the information containing structures under situations where physical control of protected microdevices may be lost and where it is necessary to prevent hostile and unauthorized users from gaining and benefiting from the use of the microdevice or from the information contained in the microdevice even if they gain physical control of the protected microdevice. These embodiments usually require protection devices designed to integrate with the microdevices either permanently or as additional safety modules which, in an off or stand-by mode of operation, allow for normal function of the processing microdevices, but when activated obliterate the targeted information. Many of these embodiments can also be used to obliterate sensitive information and incompletely erased data on replaced or discarded microdevices before they are disposed or removed from the controlled environments.
Apparatuses and methods of the present invention differ from the current art of information obliteration which often involves information destruction facilities that are improvisations of equipment originally designed for other purposes. Examples of this include various industrial scale furnaces, corrosive chemical baths, or even construction equipment driven over the discarded processing devices. Improvised processes of the prior art may fail to achieve complete information obliteration. For example, virtually the entire content of a flash memory chip can be reconstructed even if the housing is severely damaged and connectors broken. In addition, the improvised methods and devices of prior art are difficult to use under time critical emergency circumstances.